at moments after I have dreamed
by Idrelle Miocovani
Summary: When Rapunzel accidentally ends up in Eugene's room at night frightened of the hand life has dealt her, Eugene has a few comforting words for her - only if he isn't too distracted by the one question he's dying to ask her.


**A/N: **Written for a Shakespeare Quote roulette from a different site. I really love _Tangled_ and I decided to have a bit of fun with the characters, especially Rapunzel and Eugene/Flynn. I'm curious about scenes that may have occurred between the reunion of Rapunzel and her parents and the very, very end celebration of the film, or after the film proper, especially the bit which implies Eugene asked Rapunzel to marry him more than once.

Right now, this is a stand-alone vignette, but I may expand the idea later. The title comes from an e.e. cummings poem, _it is at moments after i have dreamed._ If you want inspiration (especially for lower case titles, which are stylistically awesome and my new favourite thing), this is one poet you should definitely look to!

Enjoy!

* * *

><p><strong>at moments after I have dreamed<strong>

"_Why then, can one desire too much of a good thing?" As You Like It, IV.i.124._

Eugene loved to sleep.

It wasn't that he was fundamentally lazy (he wasn't – though admittedly, he could get used to meals whenever he wanted them, rooms larger than any village inn all to himself, and generally having everything handed to him on a silver platter by a handful of personal servants); it was just that he did enjoy being comfortable. Plus, with sleep came dreams, which had been unusually pleasant lately. A second plus was that while he was living in the castle as the royal family's honoured guest, he didn't really have to worry about people trying to slit his throat while he was unconscious.

However, that didn't mean the instincts weren't still there.

He was in the middle of a dream involving Rapunzel, a large amount of cake batter and a series of events he was going to keep strictly private when he was rudely woken by those overly jumpy instincts of his. He shot out of bed, grabbed a dagger from under the mattress and landed, crouched, on the floor. He of all people should know a castle wasn't invincible, as much as he liked to pretend it was. If he had been able to infiltrate it, someone else would have figured it out as well.

He just didn't expect them to do so as quickly. His infiltration, after all, had been very, very clever.

He caught sight of a shadow passing in his peripheral vision; he spun around to face the opposite wall, but came across nothing by a flapping tapestry. The window was open, bringing in a fresh breeze along with a stream of bright moonlight.

There was a slight movement behind him, and again he spun around, only to see nothing. He frowned. Someone was here, he just couldn't tell where exactly yet. Whoever they were, they were certainly light on there feet.

"_Eugene."_

He spun, dagger poised to strike, and saw a shadow flit across the wall again. It was small and fast. A child thief, perhaps?

Behind him, something crashed to the floor.

"_Eugene!"_

He spun again and nearly dropped the dagger. He blinked, surprised.

"…Rapunzel? What… are you doing?"

She didn't have a very pleased expression on her face. In fact, she looked rather cross. "I was going to ask you the same thing."

He stared at her.

She stared back at him.

He sighed, shaking his head and setting the dagger aside. "Let me help you with that."

Rapunzel frowned, struggling with her position, but eventually allowed him to approach. She had fallen sideways into the corridor of moonlight shining in through the open window, her movements impeded by a large, thick rope that had somehow been wrapped completely around her torso. Its end lay on the floor, stretching across the flagstones, up to the window sill and out.

"This is knotted pretty badly," he said, struggling to untie her.

"I know."

"I'm not sure if I'll be able to get it undone."

"Doesn't matter," she said, blowing a puff of air out. "Just get me back up on my feet."

He raised an eyebrow. "Don't you want to be untied first?"

"Just get me up, Eugene!" she snapped.

He held up his hands in defence. "Okay, okay, one princess standing on her feet while still strangely being wrapped up in rope coming right up!"

Without further ado, he picked her up and set her on her feet.

"Thank you," she said. "Now, if you could help me back up to the window sill, I have some business that I would like to attend to."

"… you're not planning on scaling the roof, are you?" he asked.

"Now where would you get an idea like that?" she replied smartly.

He folded his arms. "You're planning on scaling the roof."

Her shoulders sagged. "Yeah…"

"Rapunzel," he said, "not to judge or anything, but don't you think that's a little dangerous?"

"What's dangerous about it?" she asked. "I used to do it all the time in my tower."

"Yeah, but you had your hair then."

"This rope holds me perfectly fine!" she said.

"You had _magic hair_ then," Eugene corrected.

"Do you see anything wrong with this rope?"

"Uh, it's wrapped around you to the point where you can't move?"

"I used to do that with my hair!"

"It was _hair_, Rapunzel!"

"This rope is as good as hair!"

"_Magic hair! _Rope is very, very different from _magic_ hair!"

"No, it's not, it's better! I was just practicing! You have to hit and miss a few times before getting it right!" She exhaled sharply, blowing out air so that her bangs flittered across her face. She looked like she was putting all her effort into holding up her end of an argument she didn't fully believe. "Besides, I made it to your room…"

"Yes, I noticed that," Eugene said. "Good for you. A round of applause. But you had _magic hair_ last time you tried to go flying and scaling walls. Seventy feet of magic hair. Do you know how much hair that is?"

She gave him a sharp look.

"Exactly, it's a lot of hair! A lot of… magic… hair." He trailed off, feeling like he was losing the argument. He glanced at Rapunzel and saw that she was still glaring at him; he sighed, bowing his head, and crossed over to her.

"Look," he said, placing a hand on her shoulder, "how about I get you out of this mess, we sit down and you tell me what this is really about. Okay, Blondie?"

The corners of her lips crinkled at the use of his old nickname for her. "I'm not exactly blonde anymore, Flynn," she said.

"And you only call me Flynn when you're pretending to be annoyed with me," he said, kissing her cheek.

A moment later, he had picked up his dagger again and sliced through the knot in the rope, helping her to unravel the cord and dump it on the floor by the window. Then they sat together on his bed, Rapunzel lying curled with her head against his chest, watching the patterns the moonlight made on the opposite wall. He held her to him, one arm around her shoulders, watching her in silence.

It would have been comfortable, if not for one thing. It felt strange to be with her in his bedroom, at night. He was glad of it – he was always glad when they could steal a moments together, alone and uninterrupted by the presence of others – but it also made him nervous. There was a question he had been longing to ask her; it was something that could only be said when they were alone. He had waited, unsure of the right time, of the right way, going over scenarios in his mind again and again, the next more ridiculous than the last, until he finally gave up and told himself that when it happened, it would happen.

He would know when the time was right to ask her.

However, that was not the only issue at the moment.

Even with Rapunzel curled against him, she looked upset. She had a little furrow in her brow, the one that usually appeared when she was troubled by something.

"Okay," he said after a moment. "What's bothering you?"

She didn't answer, continuing to watch the moonlight.

"Rapunzel?"

"Yes?"

"I can't really help you if you don't say anything."

She sighed and curled herself tighter beside him. "I know," she murmured. "Just give me a moment. I'm trying to think of the right way to tell you."

"That's a little inauspicious, don't you think?"

She looked up at him, her brow creasing again. "Since when do you use words like 'inauspicious'?"

"Since your father's advisors decided that I needed to become princelier."

"Oh. Right." She went back to looking across the room at the tapestry.

"They've been keeping me tied to a chair in the library. I'm not allowed to eat if I don't read three big books before a meal."

"Of course," she murmured.

"And then they make me write a test. To check my grammar. And if I don't use ten big words on the test, they fail me and I'm not allowed any dessert."

"Is that how it goes?" she said.

"Absolutely! It's torture by words. Who knew it could be so painful? Denying a man dessert – that's the absolute lowest blow they could give to anyone."

She smiled, laughing lightly and gently patted his cheek. "Thanks."

"No problem."

"I'm scared, Eugene," she said finally.

He looked down at her, surprised. "What? Why would you ever be scared? What's so scary about being a princess?"

She sat up, tucking her legs into her chest and wrapping her arms around them. "Everything," she murmured.

"So you're trying to run away?"

"No!" She shook her head vehemently. "No. Well… maybe." She bit her lower lip and looked up at him. "…yes?"

"And you thought that taking a rope and swinging out your window was the best means of escape?"

She shoulders sagged. "Yes." She sounded miserable.

"No, no, no, Rapunzel!" He smacked his forehead. "Haven't I taught you anything? If you use a rope, you're just going to get into trouble! What if someone walks into your room and cuts the rope? Where does that leave you? That's right – falling. Falling very fast, very far, most likely to your death, unless you somehow end up in the moat, which in and of itself is not very pleasant (I speak from experience, having ended up in several moats, nasty things, don't ever go in one), besides it just raises your chances of getting caught because moats are usually surrounded by soldiers keeping an eye out for random people jumping out of windows to land in moats, especially if they're stealing things. No, if you want to escape, don't use a rope—"

"Eugene—"

"First, get a rock climbing teacher. Second, climb out your window and scale the walls to the roof. Third—"

"Eugene, I—"

"—cross the roof, making sure you take in the view. After all, you're on top of a castle and there's no view like it. Makes for excellent sight-seeing, unless you're doing it at night, which is why the best escapes happen early in the morning—"

"_Eugene—"_

"—particularly before eight o'clock—"

"Eugene, I'm not thinking of climbing across my own castle."

He paused. "Hm." He put on a mock pensive look. "Well, then, avoid all the advice I gave you. Swinging from window to window works, as long as you don't wake up the occupants of the room you're invading – which seems to be the problem you're working on right now. Don't worry, Blondie, with a little practice you'll be the best window swinger in the world."

"Thanks." She was smiling again, but her worried look still hadn't disappeared.

He patted her hand. "I was only trying to make you laugh," he said.

"You're doing a good job. You always make me laugh."

"I know." He stretched. "That's what you hired me for."

"Hire? _Hire? _I didn't hire you! You tagged along!"

"Correction: you _made_ me tag along."

"I had to! Otherwise I wouldn't get to see the lanterns and you'd just get your silly crown back!"

"Which turned out to be _your_ silly crown! Honestly, Rapunzel, do you want to call your own crown silly?"

She crossed her arms. "I didn't know it at the time."

"I know. I'm joking – again."

She paused, playing with a strand of her short brown hair. "Do you still want the crown?" she asked.

He gave her an odd look. He wasn't sure what she meant by that. "It's your crown, Rapunzel."

"I could give it to you. When I leave."

He held up his hands. "Wait. Hang on a second – why do you want to leave?"

"I'm..." Her voice trailed off and she refused to look at him.

"Rapunzel—" He gently pressed a hand to her cheek, turning her head so she would look at him. "You just found out who you truly are. You just found your family again. No one has ever seen the king and queen so happy. And you want to give it all up? Everything? After only three months?"

She hung her head. "I'm afraid," she said. "I'm afraid I won't be a good princess. I don't think I deserve this."

"Rapunzel, look at me."

She shook her head, turning away from him. "I was happy in my tower, but always wished that I had more. Now, I have more.I have everything I ever wanted. I'm a princess. I have a mother and a father who love me. But what I have done to deserve this life? Why me? How I can be a princess who is given everything when I know there are people out there who are suffering every day? I'm a stranger in this kingdom. The people don't know me. How can I be their princess if they can't ever trust me?"

"Rapunzel," Eugene said gently, "look at me."

She turned back to him, her eyes wet with held back tears.

"You are the most kind-hearted, wonderful person I have ever met. Don't doubt yourself. Your people love you, your parents love you – they've waited a very long time for you to return, and it would sadden them all if you gave up on them now. Gothel had you in that tower for eighteen years; you deserve this. You deserve your chance to live." He squeezed her hand.

She squeezed his hand back.

"Besides," he continued, "life isn't perfect. You'll have a lot of things to figure out; and ruling a kingdom is one of them. Where I'm from, you hear a lot of people wishing they were rich and famous, as if it would solve all their problems. Well, if they looked at it more closely, they would know that having everything you want just means that you have more responsibility. You have more people to take care of, more things to do. It's not going to be a pleasant ride, but at least you get to live.

"That's all you wished for, isn't it? A chance to live. Don't run away from it quite yet, Rapunzel. I'm here for you. I know you can to it, whatever it is princesses do, whatever it is they throw at you. I have faith that you can."

She smiled – a true, brilliant smile, and even though the tears now tumbled lightly down her cheeks, they were ones of happiness. "What would I do without you, Eugene Fitzherbert?"

"Good question," he said. "I have no idea."

"You're too good for me."

He balked.

Her eyes narrowed. "What? That was a compliment!"

"Okay, then," he said. "I'm not used to compliments just as much as you're not used to being a princess. See? Now we both have things to learn."

She raised an eyebrow. "Ha ha."

"That's right, 'ha ha'!"

"You're being ridiculous."

"So are you."

"Maybe." She wiped the remaining tears away with the back of her hand.

"So, I'm wondering," Eugene said, "where did you get all of that rope?"

"The rope?" Rapunzel glanced at the coil of thick rope lying on the floor. "I got it from the guards' room when no one was looking."

"You stole it?"

"Took with the intention of putting it back!"

He raised a hand. "So, after you escaped the castle, you were going to sneak back in and replace the rope?"

"No, I was going to… I was going to send it back!" She suddenly looked very cross.

He laughed. "Whatever you say, Blondie."

She gave him one of her looks and seized a pillow, throwing it as his head.

"Ow." He caught it and threw it down. "What was that for?"

"Oh, nothing," she said, smiling. "It's just something I always wanted to try. Mother – I mean, Gothel – never let me do it to her and Pascal is too small a target."

Eugene couldn't help but laugh. The princess had discovered the joy of pillow fights.

It was definitely a sign she was getting over her cold feet. He wasn't sure how much effect his talk had had, but he was glad to see that she was bouncing back from her doubts so quickly. One could argue that she had everything she ever wanted, and he thought it was extraordinarily humble of her to realise it. But when someone had grown up in the circumstances Rapunzel had, there was no such thing as too much of a good thing.

As far as he was concerned, she deserved all of the good things the world had to offer her.

"You know," he said, "if you ever did leave, I'd go with you. I wouldn't stay here."

"I know." Her voice was quiet again, but sounded much more content now.

"I meant what I said at the tower. You are my new dream."

She turned to look at him, gently touching his face. Her fingers toyed with his hair for a moment as she shifted closer to him. She kissed him, her lips lingering on his as she murmured, "And you are mine."

He kissed her back, cradling her close. As he held her, they watched the breeze blow a leaf through the still-open window; it tumbled about the room until it drifted to the floor, glowing in the moonlight. He could just make out that it was a golden yellow instead of green; there were a number of leaves on the trees that had already begun to change. Autumn had arrived.

He had a question to ask her, a question that had haunted him for a couple of months since the idea first came to him. He hadn't dared for some time, uncertain of what her reaction would be. But now… the opportunity was just too perfect. He had to ask her, as frightened of it as he was.

"Rapunzel?"

"Yes?"

"When you asked me what you would do without me, did you mean it?"

She raised her head. "Sorry?"

"Did you mean it?" he asked again.

"Of course I did," she said softly. "Eugene, you're the most important man in my life."

"I have something I need to ask you, then," he said, sitting up.

"What is it?" she asked, also sitting up.

And there they sat, bathed in moonlight, his hands in hers with an autumn breeze blowing through the window, eyes locked together as he struggled to find the words. For some reason, he couldn't quite spit them out. Was this the right moment? Part of him worried that it wasn't, but part of him argued that he would always worry whether it was the right moment or not.

To hell with the right moment. He just needed to say it.

"Rapunzel, will you marry me?"

The corners of her lips turned upwards and her eyes widened. She placed a hand against his face and kissed him, gently murmuring her answer in his ear.

And his heart fell.

Damn.

It wasn't quite the right moment – but he knew that even if she was not ready now, eventually she would be. The right moment would come, and he would keep on asking until she gave him the answer he so longed to hear.


End file.
